Episode 285: The BIGGEST of your Big 3 Marketing Strategies

Welcome to the Unstoppable Profit Podcast. This podcast will give independent insurance agents all of the tools to grow your business and live life on your terms. Wherever you are today, if you're starting with nothing or well on your way to the success you desire, with the right people, processes and promotions in place, you will be unstoppable. And now I'd like to introduce your host, Mike Stromso.

Greetings, everybody. Welcome to the next episode of the Unstoppable Profit podcast. I am not Mike Stromso. I am Joel McKinley. I am currently taking over and hosting this episode because we're putting Mike in the hot seat to find out everything he knows about acquisitions. Baby Mike, are you ready?

Boy, it is hot boy already. And I know it's going to get even hotter. So fortunately I have some water near me so I can cool off if I need to. Go ahead and bring it, Joel.

All right, Mike. So to start it out with acquisitions, you know, we think about growing our our business like building a house. So say our members and everybody out there listening, they've built the foundation, they've got their right people, they've got the processes in place, they're promoting the heck out of it, but they want to grow faster. So, Mike, acquisitions is a great way to do that. So tell me, Mike, how many acquisitions did you, did you perform or did you do when you were in the insurance independent insurance agency business?

You know, Joel, I couldn't agree with you more. It is a very, very important part of growing an independent insurance agency faster and bigger. But my greatest encouragement is if anybody out there watching or listening to this, you always want to do it the right way. And in our independent insurance agency business, acquisitions was definitely part of our strategy, but it was just one of three. We had a three pronged marketing strategy in our agency. It was marketing for personal lines, for commercial lines, and then for acquisitions. We had a documented acquisition strategy that had bullet points, our three uniques, and everything else so that we were always in pursuit of the right prospect. But if I go way back when, and it's really what catapulted me out front because if anybody watching or listening to this doesn't know, I started from scratch in 1998 and did my first acquisition in 2001. So it wasn't very long after I started in the independent insurance agency business that I did my first acquisition. And you know, thinking back, I was listening to you and I couldn't agree more that excellent people, world class processes and systems and then promoting the heck out of it is a great foundation and it became for us when we built it in our agency. But don't get caught up in thinking that it has to be perfect.

Because it doesn't. Sometimes good enough is good enough. You want to be solid, you want to be rock solid, but don't handcuff yourself thinking it has to be perfect. Okay, so we did four acquisitions. Every one of them was very different in their own way. And it was through that doing them, the opportunity came. I looked at the numbers. Some of the numbers were, if you will, more perfect than others. But you know, there were some which I wasn't quite sure. And I learned a ton of lessons through them as well. And now the that I'm privileged to be connected to people across America and North America who are very skilled in the acquisition opportunity. I now communicate with them consistently on behalf of our UPP members. And so the combination of those two things really brings the depth of knowledge that I've got to be able to help our members. And Joel, I'm sure you know that our fastest growing members are, are partnering with acquisitions as part of the growth strategy and doing acquisitions. In fact, you know, I'm thinking about one of our members, Mariah, who I'm not mistaken, last year, three of them.

In one year because she had earned and become more and was ready to go ahead and make those acquisitions and grow.

Yeah. And there's multiple other members that have done the same thing and Rob and a lot of others. So anyway, they have done a great job. And so I'm glad you brought this subject up because a lot of people need to be thinking about this and it's not something you want to wake up on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday morning, say, oh, I think I'm going to do an acquisition today. It's a long term strategy and you want to be prepared, but you don't have to be over prepared. And let's get into some of the stories to help everybody. Our audience today on acquisitions.

Perfect. So, Mike, when you're getting ready for an acquisition, obviously the first thing you have to do is prepare and do your due diligence. So when you're thinking about that in the initial phases, what is most critical during that initial preparation? Due diligence. And so that you can avoid some of those costly lessons that you might have had early on.

Yeah, I'm thinking back to one that was probably four or five years ago in the agency business. It was referred to us by the marketing rep for our largest carrier and it was a local agency, which I love the local agencies, if that came to the table. And because, you know, you bring on their book of business. By the way, for anybody taking notes, please write this one down. If you are acquiring a book of business from a corporate entity or an LLC or similar, you don't want to buy the corporate assets. You do not want to acquire the corporate assets. You only want to buy the book of business because you don't want to buy corporate issues and problems. If you buy those assets, then you buy all the liabilities that come with them. You don't want to do that. Very, very, very important. So the book of business. So this one, I had an opportunity to talk with the owners of the book of business. Very stable, very experienced, 20 to 30 year agency. Okay? So they came over to our office, into our conference room, which I love it when they come to our premises so they can meet the team, experience the culture. And I flat out said to the owner, who was probably late 60s, I said, so why us? I mean, why are you here and how can we serve you and how can we help you? She goes, I'm done. I'm ready to move on.

Your agent, we'll just call her Susie, our marketing rep. Susie said, I should come talk to you. So here I am. I said, well, fantastic. And so we got to know each other and I got to understand why they wanted to do this. Now, in this particular situation.

Just know that there was another gal with her that I didn't know who that was yet, but I, I, I'm. It's a coffee conversation, right?

Right.

We're just having coffee. We're talking about why this is happening, why. And I asked her what's important to her as far as somebody who might purchase their book of business, et cetera, et cetera. And so I, I learned to give them all the answers. You know, we're a local independent insurance agency business. Our ownership is local. This is who we are. These are our core values. This is our core purpose. We have a team that is trained and has ongoing training, et cetera, et cetera. We're basically selling our agency to them is what we're doing. So, you know, we're having this great conversation. I got to the point and I said, so is this person an owner of your agency as well? And she goes, no, it's actually my daughter. I said, well, fantastic. I said, do you work in the agency? And she said, yeah. And so we got into it a little bit and have a conversation. And I said, so how long you been with the agency? Et cetera et cetera. And something came up about family. So I was able to go down that road about the family of the daughter because the owner shared about her husband and everything. And so I said to the daughter, I said, so is your husband working in the agency as well? And here's what I wanted to share with you. She said, no, he works for another agency. I said, oh, really? An independent insurance agency. She goes, yeah. And she named the agency and said, but he's 100% commercial.

I said, oh, cool. So I logged that in the back of my mind. So we got to the point and the owner was very forthright because the number came up, the quote number that she was looking for to sell the agency. And I said, so what is that? And it was 525,000. And I said, great, I'm glad that you are thinking like that and you have a number. I would love to have a deeper conversation and see if we can, you know, meet your request, etc. Etc. So the next logical thing to do, if you're open to it and ready, let's get a non disclosure agreement signed or an NDA. That's your first step when you're in this position. Get the NDA signed. Get the NDA signed. Get the NDA signed and dated by both parties. That opens up the door legally so you can share information. Because the next step would have been, you know, three to five years of carrier loss history reports, okay? And profit loss statement for the last three years minimum. And Joel McKinley, I know I've shared with you because you're learning so much. There's a sheet that I created which are the top 10 things. I believe it's 10 things. The top things people and agents need to be thinking about if they're going to enter into the conversation about an acquisition.

Mike, you actually gave 14, so you gave four bonuses on that one. Before you move on, Mike, I want, I hope people didn't miss this. What you said when the conversation started, you said, I asked her what's important for them. I mean, what you're selling this, they don't have to sell to you. They have other options out there. And it's almost like you're courting them. And ultimately what's people's favorite thing in the world to talk about is themselves. And you asked her what's important for them to know and that makes you open. And ultimately people are looking at their business. It's their baby. They've built it over their entire career. They don't want to just throw it out to whoever. By you showing that caring compassion for what's important to her, it also shows that you're caring and compassionate for their clients. That was a Chris Raiders gold nugget on that one. I hope people caught that.

Yeah, well, bigger than that.

Really, emotionally, you've got to know this is their baby. I mean, think about how hard you work in your independent insurance agency business. The long nights, the tough conversations.

Recruiting team members, terminating team members, you know, everything that you go through. And then, you know, I remember getting to the point where I was at, you know, 20 years, 25 years, 30 years, 35 years, and you begin to reflect on everything you've gone through. And now, emotionally, you know, you're talking about them giving up. It's like when your daughter gets married. You know, my wife and I watched Father of the Bride last night because we love Steve Martin, and we just wanted some humor in our lives. And so, you know, if you look at that, you know, he had to give up his daughter to marriage. Right. And I know someday that will happen to you. Joel.

We're not going to discuss that yet.

So anyway. But, you know, sometimes you're not prepared for that emotionally. So you have to know that, and you have to be sensitive to that. You have to care about that, and you have to be concerned about that. And so, you know, I'm thinking about another acquisition situation with one of our members where this was a great agency, and the member called me and says, mike, this agency owner's decided it's time to move on, et cetera, et cetera. I said, well.

Who else are they talking to besides you about the acquisition? And that agent said, I'm not sure. I said, you need to ask that question and find out. That's another question. How many other agencies are you talking about about this acquisition? Because if you're up against four other players, then that's something to consider and to really be thinking about. So in that particular situation, and it was a great agency, it was a great deal, period. The numbers worked out, everything worked out about it, including one of the two owners, husband and wife, was going to stay onto the agency for a period of time, was an absolute. What we call maven in the local communities, which is a maven, is somebody. Everybody knows them, and they know everybody else, and, you know, they flock to the relationship of the maven.

So.

So she was going to stay on. Couldn't have been a better deal. But in conversation with that agency, you know, the thing was that we wanted to find out why us.

Why do you want us to be the acquirer of your life's work? And those agency owners said, we want somebody local. We want somebody who is held in high esteem in the local community. We want somebody who's going to be around for a number of years in front of us. We want somebody who's the right fit, meaning all of our carriers match everything else. We want somebody who has the right culture, who has the right attitude towards independent insurance agency ownership and all of that. And the good news for this member agent was they had it. And so, yes, they could have gone out to the PE realm, if you will, with all the love to our PE partners out there, private equity partners, but they didn't want that. They wanted somebody local. They had already earned, you know, their life's wealth and, you know, immediate payment wasn't important to them. So that was their situation and it worked out. And there's a lot of people that feel that way. So really, really important to just really have conversations, get the NDA signed, understand what kind of money is important to them and how they would like to get paid and know this about the money as well. A lot of people don't want lump sums. Some people do. You just don't know. That's why you need to get the NDA signed and be able to have those conversations and really get to a number. Okay. And then, then there's a whole bunch to it. And I'm going to let you ask the questions and lead it here. But, you know, there's a lot based on my experience and shall I say lessons and wins, but lots of lessons meaning failure situations within acquisitions as well. So the NDA, why this deal? Find all that out. Letter of intent is the next logical step if you feel it's a good deal as soon as you can get the letter of intent signed. And just because you sign a letter of intent doesn't mean that it's going to close. That's just the next logical step. Which makes put takes the deal to the next step between you and the owner or owners only. And that really means in my mind, that they've chosen you. So that's fantastic stuff.

Okay, so Mike, let's assume that they have, you've had the conversation and they feel that you are a good fit for them. But let's go and let's figure this out if they are a good fit for you and bringing them in. So how do you ensure that their culture and their strategic alignment between the two of you is important and matches and why is that pivotal? To the success of the acquisition?

Well, it depends on how big the agency that's being acquired is, meaning how many people are involved. Like if it's one or two people, like maybe an owner and a service person as an example, that's a whole different dynamic than an agency where you have one or two owners and then six to 10 people as an example, that's a much bigger situation. So they're all unique in their own right. But at the end of the day, it is about culture and you must understand what the current culture is like, if you will, what the personality of the agency is like. And I'm going to give you an example in just a moment. It was my most recent acquisition, the fourth of the four. And I. I learned something that to this day I still shake my head a little bit because there were a lot of lessons in that acquisition. Don't get me wrong, it was a great deal and it worked out well in the long run, but there were a lot of lessons involved in that. So you got to make sure it's a good culture fit. And we'll just use that particular situation as the example because now that I speak this into existence, so to speak, it's going to come out there anyway. So this particular acquisition was for a local agency where the owner had decided, I'm done. And the owner was in his 40s, so just decided that I wanted to move on, to do something else. Didn't want to fight the agency and the industry anymore, wasn't passionate about it anymore. Knew me, knew me for a long, long time. Actually came to one of our events, one of our boot camps and you know, was re. Energized, refocused, but after a period of time, right back to the same old, same old, and said, hey, are you interested? I said, I am. And I took them, that person, down the same path that I just shared, you know, NDA, etc. Etc. Etc. The great news about this deal, it was a local agency that was going to close their office doors.

Same agency management system.

That agency's top four carriers were our top four carriers. I mean, couldn't have been a sweeter deal. Now, in my humble opinion, they were overstaffed. So I needed to deal with that, I needed to understand that. But I was thinking I will just. And I think they had three or four people on their team, maybe five in addition to the owner. And so I was thinking, I'll keep their top two and we should be able to serve the book well, et cetera, et cetera, with those Two, and then fold it into our agency office, which was local. Anyway, so it was a sweet deal. A sweet deal. So we got the letter of intent signed and we got to the due diligence period. Now let's touch on due diligence very, very quickly. The due diligence is the time that you have and it's a period of time and it's stated in the purchase and sales agreement. It's the period of time that you have to evaluate everything that they said about the agency book. In other words, we've got a thousand clients. These, this is our historical loss ratios with our carriers. This, this, this and this. It's your time to verify all of that is true. And once you get to the end of the due diligence period, the clock is ticking, game is on, right? You give up all your rights. Time to close. Okay, so normally that due diligence period, depending on the size of the agency, you know, 60 days, 90 days, it can be 30 days if you want. It just depends on your ability to evaluate quickly. So, you know, we're going through the due diligence period. And part of my due diligence requirements were I was going to interview every one of the team members at our office just like they were a brand new employee. And I told the owner, I said, there's no guarantee that we're going to hire these people, we're going to treat this situation. They're all a new team member, et cetera, et cetera. So we did. And what we found, because we have a hiring system and we put them through the same exact hiring system that we would put any team member candidate through from an evaluation standpoint. Because our number one goal always, always, always is to protect our culture. Protect our culture. Protect our culture. So we did, we only brought on one of those team members.

Wow.

To the agency. So we closed. And the good news is we made that team member the primary go to.

For all service for that agency book. I mean, it was 1100 clients, I want to say. So that was a quite a bit of a load. But we made sure that that agency team member has support and everything else needed to, you know, take care of things. And we trade her, trained her in our way to delegate and empower other team members and push everything down to the lowest level, which I know you're aware of, Joel. So that was how we did it. Now, now here's the thing that I didn't see coming in that acquisition. Now keep in mind, it was local. It was about a 15 minute drive from our office and I should have done this and I did not. So it was a big lesson for everybody out there. Remember, our top four carriers were their top four carriers, 80% of the book, roughly.

So we did the deal. And all of a sudden, by the way, we were ready when this was done. I mean, when escrow closed, we were in California, so we had an escrow. When escrow closed, we sent out communications. We welcomed everybody. I did a video with the old owner, which I had not done before. I thought, I'm going to try something different. Knowing what I know, I would not do it that way again. By the way, it's my opinion, as I sit here at least today, just sit on the situation and continue to serve the customers for a period of time, at least until all the carrier integration goes through. And that can be, you know, two, three, four months depending on the carrier. And then as that starts to settle and you get all that resolved, then maybe start sending out proactive communications. So with that being said, because we did that, the phone started ringing off the hook, you know, who are you guys, et cetera, et cetera. So I wouldn't do that again. I'll say that.

In addition to that, we found out that that book of business. And here's really what I wanted to share.

The culture of that agency, even though we had the same carriers, was the, the culture of the clients. The client culture and their mindset and the way they were taken care of was not the same as ours. We had our clients trained. We did things a certain way at our agency. We did business the SIA way and they were trained and they were accustomed to it and they followed our lead and they did what we asked that agency, I'm just going to call it needy. Those clients were needy. They had certain expectations. They expected to be rewritten, they expected to get called when their policy was on the brink of canceling for non payment, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, which was not our way. And how could I overcome that? I could have driven over to that office for five days straight and sat there and just observed if I had done that, driven over to that office for five days straight and just sat there and observed that, I would have picked all this up.

I actually heard you bring that up last week during our platinum coaching group sessions. You brought up, make sure you check out the personality of the book. Are they your ideal client avatar? Do they match and do you have that documented that I wrote that down to ask you a follow up about that.

Yeah, yeah, that's what it was. It was a lesson. But, you know, that's why we're here. Right? We want to share with people everything that we've learned, the wins and the lessons, so that it doesn't happen to you.

So removing as many speed bumps for our members as possible. So.

And agents nationally as well.

That's right. So, Mike, you talk all the time. You have to keep the agency healthy no matter what. And you, you affectionately call it Bob. You said, you know, we're doing this to make sure that, Bob, the agency is healthy. So with that said, the financial planning, obviously the numbers are important. You bring in the right clients, you find the right agency to acquire. So with cash flow being the key post acquisition challenge, how do you recommend independent agents plan financially to maintain stability and growth?

You know, that's a great question, and thank you for saying that.

It's.

It's multifold, is it not? I mean, you know, leading a business, owning a business, there's a lot of moving parts. You know.

I said for many, many years until Joey Coleman came on this podcast. Thank you, Joey. If you're listening or watch listening to this or watching it because shifted my mindset, that's probably within the last year.

Because I said, for years, who's our number one customer? Jfum.

Your team.

Your team. Right. I. I said that for years. And so Joey came on the podcast and, and Joey Coleman written a couple of books.

I lost them in my mind for just a minute. Never, Never lose a customer again was the first one, never lose a customer again. And the second one, never lose an employee again. Right. And so he said, right there in the book, he said, if you want, if you want me to join your podcast, he said it on page like 219 or something like that. Email me. So I did, and he came on and thank you. The shared. He was awesome. But he said on that podcast, he said, mike, so in your business, who's the number one customer? And I said, your team members. And I agree with that. He said, yeah, I used to think that way too. But in my consulting with and speaking for many, many Fortune 500 companies, I now have a different take on it. And I said, do tell. And he said.

My number one customer or our number one customer is ourselves.

And I heard him say that. And I thought, wow, because it's the airline flight attendant, right?

Put on your own mask first.

Put on your own mask first. Which is what we teach as well. So I agree with that. We've got to take care of ourselves first. Okay? So these everything that we've got moving around us in the agency business, etc. Etc. We've got to take care of ourselves first. You know, there's this, what we call a societal lie out there that being selfish is a bad thing. Well, depends on who you are, you know, in your soul, in your heart maybe. But being selfish and taking care of yourself is vitally important. And so selfish in that way is important and it's good because if you don't take care of yourself, you can't help anybody else. So all of these moving parts, the culture, who is the leadership, who is the ownership team members, what are their goals? Do you set goals as an agency? Which is another thing, right. Which would be a great question for me if I was interviewing somebody who was looking to sell, I would say, does your agency set goals?

And you know how we feel about questions, right, Joel?

Better the question, the better the result.

And what do you do after you ask the question?

You gotta zip it, don't say nothing and ask follow up questions and dig.

And dig, right? That's right, yeah. And so, you know, I learned in a book that I was reading recently, True north, simply the question is the answer. So digest that one for a minute. With that being said, so all of these things are going on. And so yes, culture and everything else is important. It's vitally important and it really dictates the value and that final number as well, because I know, because now I've been on the other side of selling an agency business and I am 100% convinced that yes, our EBITDA was very strong, but I'm convinced that the organization that acquired our agency.

Paid top dollar because of our brand and who we were as an organization, not only in our local communities, but reputation wise across the country. They saw it and the others didn't because they did the right work. So let's get back to the numbers. So what we have is an acquisition cash flow form. Back to the pure numbers. Because part of what we teach independent insurance agents, right, is numbers don't lie.

That's right.

The core KPIs.

You got to know your KPIs, but so what you do, because EBITDA is involved. And if you talk to anybody out there in the acquisition realm, you know, I'm thinking of my good friend Kerry Wallace as an example and her team, they help people get very, very clear on what the true value of an agency is. And let me be clear on one thing. May I jfum.

Please do.

By the way, anybody Out. If this is your first time on the podcast, JFUM is Joel Friggin Unstoppable McKinley. We have acronyms galore at new PP, so.

So back to.

Sharing about that. The true value of your agency is truly what somebody's willing to pay for it.

You know, I hear a lot of conversation out there, you know, oh, it's, you know, multiple of EBITDA, or it's 2 x 2 and a half x 3 x 2 times, 2 and a half times, 3 times or more the annual commission income. I get it, I get it. But whatever somebody's willing to pay is the true value of the agency. Okay? So whatever that number is, then we have an acquisition cash flow form where you simply plug in all the numbers.

And.

And if you've got, you know, an owner that's leaving, they know they're no longer paying office rent, and a number of other ongoing expenses disappear.

Then that will strengthen the cash flow and the numbers. But we have an acquisition cash flow form that goes out up to 10 years, so we can dial that in. And really what you have to consider is the retention.

Because that retention amount is absolutely critical. Okay. And so if you just wanted something very quickly, just assume that you're going to lose 15% every year.

Wow.

And so do the numbers still work in your favor after five years?

After seven years?

Unless it's a big, big deal, you want to have this thing paid off in seven years. If you're financing right, Especially with a bank. And let me talk about that for a second. May I please?

Go for it.

Yeah. So I mean, there's two ways that you're gonna, if you're not gonna, you know, pay cash upfront. As an example, there's normally two ways, okay, that you're going to make payments on the balance due or the debt. One, the owner will self finance. In other words, let's say it's $500,000 is the cost of the agency book, right? So let's say the owner says, I don't need any cash. Well, let's make this easy. Okay? So it's 500, $600,000, $500,000 book, okay? And you're going to make payments for four years. All right? So they want 20% down. So you give them $100,000 down.

And then you're going to make payments on the $400,000 over four years. So that's $100,000 a year, okay? So you divide that out by 12 months and they're going to add some interest. Okay. That's where an owner will self finance, or they might want to. If you don't have the cash for the down payment, they might want 25% down, they might want a little bit more. Who knows? Okay. You can go out to a bank and get the money for the down payment based on leveraging your book or other assets you have and then make payments to the owner. The reason the owners sometimes don't want cash up front is because they have to pay taxes, capital gains taxes, on the money they get. Okay. And so by stringing it out, they pay those capital gains taxes over time, not all at once, and it's more favorable to them. By the way, other key partners in any acquisition deal are your CPA or both CPAs and a business attorney. Vitally, vitally important. And you want to get clear on them right up front. That's around the time of before the letter of intent. Okay. You want to have the business attorney and the CPAs all engaged, all in the mix before the letter of intent from time to time. So that's a little bit about, you know, owners self financing. Or you could go get a loan for the entire amount from a bank and then just make payments back to the bank.

Now, in today's market, as we record this In January of 2024, the interest rates right now on a bank loan are high.

Okay? So you must consider that you must get very, very clear on how all the numbers are going to work out, because, you know, that amount of interest alone will be somewhat substantial. So you want to work with people who understand the industry. And I'm thinking about one of our other members, Lynette, who has done multiple acquisitions as well. But Lynette's spouse, partner in life, feels very strongly about leveraging personal assets. And so Lynette went out and found a partner that only leverages the book of business. Good for her. Okay, so with that being said.

There'S, you know, lending institutions out there that will do that, right? And then banks, I mean, there's multiple industry lending partners who will just leverage the book of business. They won't attach to your house or other physical assets, so to speak. So it's a whole.

Somewhat complex situation with an acquisition, but this is all important information, all stuff you need to get lined up, up. And I know that on that form that you so generously offered, did you say how people watching or listening can get that form?

So there is Mike's acquisition and merger things to think about from the trenches. It's 14 things you need to pay attention to if you would like that. Send me an email at Joel, that's J O e l@upplife.com that's joel@upplife.com put in the subject line, grow my agency. And I will send that to you free for you. No strings attached, nothing. I'll get it to you so that you can make sure that you don't have as many lessons in your next acquisition moving forward. Mike, what else, what else, what else do they need to know? What else can we help them with?

Oh, there's so much more and I'm sure on that form, thank you for the offer and I, I think everybody should take advantage of that. If you're thinking about doing an acquisition at any point in your agency career, email Joel that form just so you know what to start thinking about. All of it may not apply to you, but at least you'll know. And that's one of the things that we do for independent insurance agency owners and leaders across America is to support them in their acquisition opportunities as well. But you know, I've got the agency DNA form in front of me, the agency that's currently owned that you're leveraging as well as the agency DNA of the acquisition target. You know, it includes all these things. Ask you to list your insurance carriers, number of years with the carrier, the annual written premium, the commission percentage from the carriers, what the annual historical commission has been, the renewal retention percentage by carrier, the loss ratios, a little bit about profit sharing contingency, and then revenue by line of business profile, meaning personal lines, non standard auto lines, commercial lines, revenue, workers compensation revenue, commercial auto revenue, benefits, life insurance and other. I mean, it takes a deeper dive. This is both sides of the equation that's in play. There's just a lot more to it. But there's two things. Let's wrap with these two things because we've, we've given them a lot of meat to chew on, right? 32 times. Our parents taught us to chew the food before we digest it. So let's talk about technology for a minute. And that deal that we had, that was such a sweet deal, local, top four carriers, 80% of the business. They also had the same agency management system we did.

So our IT company was local. So I called the IT company. And that's another thing. You need to think about all of the technology.

The CRMs, the AI technology, all of that, okay? But the agency management system where all the data is housed is critical. Okay? So that particular agency had the same one that we did, so is able to match I had the IT company physically go over to the office, make sure that we could get it out fast and we wouldn't have any hiccups. And we did. So that was fantastic. So if you got different agency management systems, that's a whole nother thing to consider. You want to consider that before the deal is done. That is a do not diligence matter. Okay, so some agency management systems out there, I'm not going to name names. They charge people for the data, which is theirs. Wow. Exactly. And it can be significant, like in the fives to ten thousands or more sometimes. So you've got to consider all of these things. So the agency management system, all the technology, phone systems, website, phone numbers, all the historical communication data, you want to acquire all of it. You want the website, you want the phone numbers, you want all of it. All of it. All of it. And then, you know, drive it into your agency. So that's why it's important to have an attorney who's got all of that in the purchases and sale agreement all wrapped up. And there's so much more. But my greatest encouragement, Joel 1, is if acquisitions is going to be part of your growth strategy into the future. Get ready. Begin to prepare yourself now. Get dialed in and documented and shared with your leadership team, if you have one, or clear yourself. What does your acquisition strategy look like? And more importantly than that, why you?

Why should somebody sell to you over and above any and all other options available to them? Because they have options. They don't need you. Just like a new customer, they don't need you. But why you? They're talking to you for a reason. So it really is up to you to share with them. Why you? Over and above any and all other options and give them every reason to partner with you and not somebody else. What value do you bring to the table? So that's really the preparation that you really need to start thinking about and then understanding everything else. So. And the other thought that I wanted to share is, you know, every deal is different. Every deal is different. They're all unique. They've all got their own nuances. So that's why it's important to have somebody by your side. So that's why we're here to help independent insurance agents grow their business, create wealth, and have more freedom. And that book of business is the wealth. Go ahead.

So if you just for everyone out there listening, you were not born with a spirit of fear. If you're an independent insurance agency entrepreneur and you are looking, don't be afraid. We Believe in you. And Mike, where can they link up with us next to learn more to be able to move their business forward, maybe learn more about acquisitions and get on the fast track to grow in their business?

That's a great question because you know, some of the agents that we talked about and many, many more will be at our next live event. Our next live event is in San Antonio, Texas. It's the week of March 4th. If you'd like to join us there, all you need to do is commit. There is currently no cost for the seat. You just got to show up and be committed when you come. With that being said, it's in San Antonio, Texas, the week of March 4th. And go to mastermind. The word mastermind.com Mike Stromso.com. i'll slow down and repeat that. Mastermind.Mike Stromso.com. that's M I K E S T R O M S O E. And I'm sure that's around here somewhere, whatever device you're watching this on or listening to. Okay? So just go there. And the ability to fill out the form is all over the page. Initially. It's on the homepage in the top right. Just click on it, fill it out, and it will be received by our team. We will confirm with you that you are committed because we don't want people that aren't committed. Okay. Because there's time, expense, and everything else to get there. We will fulfill your commitment. So all of the agency we've been talking about and so much more will be there. We will be teaching, collaborating, masterminding together, all with the intent of helping people grow their business, create wealth, and have more freedom.

Mike, my brain is about to explode with all of the knowledge you just dropped about acquisitions. I know it's a big question out there for people that haven't done it yet, but tomorrow's a new day. They can start that acquisition tomorrow.

Yeah, I'm thinking about. Hang on. I'm thinking about my scrolls, baby. Reading them every day. Number one in the scrolls. Today I begin a new life. So today we begin a new life. Why not you and why not now?

That's right. Well, thanks, Mike. I'll turn it back over to you as the host of the Unstoppable Profit podcast. Mike, how are we going to close this out?

I just have to say, Joel McKinley, great job.

Thanks, Mike.

Good job. I think we have a future host in training who's ready to take it on himself. So I may be stepping aside. And Joel will be hosting the podcast in the future from time to time.

I'm always ready to take the opportunity.

Mike I guess we'll just repeat that. Join us in San Antonio if you're ready and committed. Mastermind.mikestromso.com we can't wait to help you. We can't wait to teach you and to help you grow like never before. Joel Great job.

Hey, thanks Mike. And thanks everybody for listening. Take action.

You got that? See ya.

Do you love the podcast but don't know where or how to get started? Visit www.upplife.com that's up l I f e.com to learn more about our coaching and Mastermind programs and how you can join our community of growth oriented agency owners today.